An uphill start for the Team HRC riders on day one at Magny-Cours

Team HRC is currently in action at the Nevers Magny-Cours Circuit in France with factory riders Xavi Vierge and Iker Lecuona. The duo was on track for the first practice sessions of this ninth WorldSBK round, both of which ran in warm and sunny conditions. While Vierge suffered a crash in FP2 due to the track conditions and placed fourteenth overall, Lecuona rounded out the day in seventeenth position.

Both Spanish riders made progress during FP1, working systematically to begin setting up their CBR1000RR-R machines together with their respective technicians. With the riders electing to focus on race prep rather than outright lap times, a best of 1’38.068 for Vierge and a 1’38.218 for Lecuona saw the Team HRC duo position twelfth and fifteenth at the session’s end.

Ten minutes into the afternoon’s second practice, Vierge suffered an incident through turn 3 which saw him transported to the circuit medical centre for medical checks. The session was red-flagged as a result of the dirty track, which appears to have been the cause of Xavi’s crash, but resumed a few minutes later, before a crash for another rider brought a second red flag shortly afterwards. Xavi did not return to the track this afternoon and later he re-joined his team in the garage for the normal post-session debrief. Later in the day, having suffered quite a hard blow in the fall, he was transported to the Pierre-Beregovoy hospital in Nevers for a thorough medical check, again as a precautionary measure. The Spaniard will also undergo a medical check-up tomorrow morning prior to the third practice session.

Team-mate Iker meanwhile continued to prepare for the weekend’s three races during what remained of FP2. Focusing with his team to find the feeling with the bike that is lacking, he was not quite able to improve on his morning’s best and therefore placed seventeenth in the day’s combined standings. Thanks to his FP1 time, Vierge positioned fourteenth at the end of day one.